Jeffrey D. Sachs, Professor of Sustainable Development and Professor of Health Policy and Management at Columbia University, is Director of Columbia’s Center for Sustainable Development and of the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network. His books include The End of Poverty, Comm…read more

Comments

I congratulate Jeff on his refreshing article in which he rightly focuses on the contribution data for development can make to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. Too often, commentators have limited their focus to how data can improve measurement of the SDGs. But as Jeff's article reminds us, data for development can help achieve the SDGs, and can be used to assist practitioners at every step of the way; from poverty mapping using satellite images that show the spread of deforestion or urbanization, to digital disease surveillance that can provide alerts when people report ebola-like symptoms, or the real-time tracking of price of food staples that can indicate when interventions are needed in a community to avoid child stunting and malnutrition.

Data analysis can be deployed just as powerfully in the humanitarian context, to help mitigate against fragile progress being wiped out when disaster strikes. Digital data can be used for social media needs mapping (reporting damaged utilities), understanding population displacement (using cellphone tower data), tracking how long it takes a community to recover and helping prepare for the next emergency - targeting assistance for those in need.

On accountability, in addition to sharing open data to drive public accountability, public servants/watchdog agencies can use algorithms to identify and investigate possible corruption. And NGOs and agencies working in service delivery can be promptly alerted to underperformance, giving the opportunity to make improvements before funds are wasted.

With such huge potential for driving progress, I welcome the call for increased funding in data systems to support the SDGs, and note that by boosting evidence-based decision-making and improving early intervention mechanisms - such investment would make funding go further in the medium to long term.

Dear Jeffrey! I guess "revolution" was needed so that people understood the concept>>On the topic of big data and data revolution I want to bring to your attention a recent situation in Colombia where a small army of revolutionary thinkers gathers in Cartagena to discuss this topic.

Interesting that they choose this site. Would have they made the same decision knowing that a good portion of the population is not having access to water? As you can imagine...the tourist zone is never affected and who cares about the locals.

Would the have made the same decision to host the event in Cartagena knowing that only $5 of every $100 spent actually stays in the local economy? All of these people present at the event are all development advocate!!

It was interesting that the event took place in Colombia where there is no interest from the various government's department to collaborate on data collection.

The problem with this revolutionary call to action is...that it is so disconnected from what is most important that it will only create new government jobs but do little to help the people that actually need help.

Let's do something revolutionary and lobby for a meaningful poverty line...there is nothing revolutionary about big data unless it's used to change the people that manage this data.

"Problems cannot be solved with the same mind set that created them" - I think it's from Albert Einstein.

This could be an amazing acheivement, although just like splitting the atom could and most likely will be used incorrectly (i.e. the atomic bomb). Engineers and scientists push the limits and make available wonderful and innovative technologies, however are always used for one or more political agendas, and if possible privatized for profit.

It goes without saying that Knowledge is power. "While the cost estimates are necessarily provisional, especially in this era of disruptive technological change, the new study suggests that proper data systems for the SDGs will require at least $1 billion per year to cover all of the 77 lower-income countries. Of that sum, around half should be financed through official development assistance, which implies an increment of at least $200 million per year above current donor flows."

who will ultimately flip the bill here and what conditions will be imposed on the availability of this data by those who do?

I think Zsolt has a good point this just like any technology is a tool whether it is used for the benefit of all or just a few depends on our social paradigm, values and such. I hope that one day our Mutual Human technologies will catch up to our mechanic ones. Read more

While the aspiration of the SDG is good we will not be able to implement such plans until we change our whole human paradigm, the way we relate to each other.

At this stage everything is still driven by our self-serving, egocentric nature. All calculations, negotiations and action is subjective and introverted. And this is why even the best laid plans, the most optimal looking human structures like liberal democracy, free market economy is distorted and fails after a while.

We already know that we evolved into a globally interconnected and interdependent system but we still want to use our inevitable interconnections for ourselves without any regards to the collective. Staying with the data/IT theme we are all individual workstations in a network, hacking into the network to exploit it for ourselves.

We have to learn to change our attitude, our approach upside down. We need to connect to the system in order to safeguard, mutually complement the most ideal state, function of the whole network. We can do it through positive motivation since based on up to date science and on the field data from the global crisis it is easy to show everyone that the prosperity, health and survival of the individual is directly dependent and parallel with the prosperity, health and survival of the collective. Read more

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